Chapter Text
Bonnet and Edward had been back together on the Revenge for just over a month before Izzy and Roach served their first overnight shift together.
The past month had Izzy musing that maybe hell might not be so bad. Just as long as it didn’t consist of Bonnet and Edward making moon eyes at each other constantly or stealing away to shadowy areas to kiss each other stupid. Izzy had lost track of how many times he’d come upon Ed and Bonnet locked together at the lips and the…everything.The crew spent the time tolerating the stomach churning displays of public affection with eye rolls and good natured ribbing. Izzy spent the time considering jumping overboard.
Probably would have too, if he had anywhere else to go.
Nowhere to go and no one to turn to. Story of his life. His only other friend had been taken out by an English cannonball because Izzy asked him for a favor. The wider criminal community, who had never liked him but feared him, had more reason to want him dead than ever before. He'd turned traitor. Turned his own Captain into the English in order to entrap him. Or at least, that was the going story at every port they went to over the last few months. No one wanted to hear his side. How he was just trying to get Blackbeard out of the silken claws of the Gentleman Pirate. Return his Captain to his former glory. They wouldn't care that he'd turned on Bonnet, turned Bonnet in, not Edward. That he'd bought his Captain's freedom at the cost of his own. He was a traitor and was as good as dead if he didn’t watch his back. Both pirates and the Navy were gunning for him. At the last three ports, he hadn’t even left the ship.
They'd said it had been a less than fitting punishment, Blackbeard only cutting off his little toe. Whispers had grown, how it should have been his foot at least, or even better, his life. Those that heard about the punishment jeered and laughed at him. How the great Israel Hands had been reduced to a limping, former shell of the fearsome pirate he had been. The new crew didn’t respect him, not after he’d been found to have harbored Lucius in secret. They yelled jeers and insults as the Kraken had whipped him within an inch of his life. When it was done and he was finally allowed to lay on his belly on the filthy deck, back shredded and bleeding, Lucius had returned the favor of saving his life by making sure he didn’t bleed to death or die from infection. Luckily for the boy and him, the Kraken decided he wanted his scribe back. Lucius spent most days hiding out until summoned and hoping that Blackbeard didn’t remember his existence. It was a simple strategy. Out of sight, out of mind. And it worked, mostly, by virtue of the fact Ed spent most days and nights absolutely pissed.
It didn't work for Izzy though. He had no choice but to report to his Captain as First Mate, which put him in the line of fire more often than not. He told himself he was used to it. The yelling. The recriminations. The tears. Ed’s when he left the room and his Captain thought no one could hear, and his own, screamed into a pillow behind the closed door of his cabin. After all, if Ed got shitfaced and knocked him around a few nights a week, he had no one to blame but himself. Silently, he agreed with everyone who said it was far less than deserved.
With Bonnet's return a month ago, things had calmed. At least the beatings and the worst of the drinking had stopped. The reprieve allowed most of his injuries to finally heal. Bonnet’s crew had generally stayed away from him since they'd come back aboard. Even Lucius seemed to give him a wide berth. Fine by him. The less time he had to spend in close contact with any of those imbeciles, the better. He'd felt the heat of their gazes on his back. Heard the word "traitor" hissed towards him on the ocean winds. It was no less than he deserved. They wanted him gone and he didn't want to be near them. If he could have left, he would have. But where would he go? Who would have him?
Israel Hands, the most fearsome swordsman on the high seas, seasoned pirate for over thirty years, First Mate to the Dread Captain Blackbeard, brought low by the loyalty of his own heart.
Izzy's chest feels heavy as he steps out from below deck, the sliver of a new moon just beginning the climb into her midnight canvas. A strong breeze curls along the back of his neck and tickles the fine hairs, cool in contrast to the heat of his skin. Edward may have traded in his leathers for more comfortable clothes, but Izzy did not relent. It was his mark. The mark of Blackbeard’s crew. He set an example. Besides, not like he had any other clothes and no one was tripping over themselves to offer that or anything else.
Izzy and Edward’s relationship had changed dramatically with Bonnet’s first disappearance, and it changed dramatically again when the ponce came back. Ed had tried to speak to him about it, but Izzy had shied away. He couldn’t do it. He wanted to be a good First Mate but he just couldn’t listen to Ed wax poetic about Bonnet. All he wanted to know was if he was getting kicked off the ship. Ed seemed surprised and assured him he wasn’t. When he tried to keep talking, Izzy shut down. Outright shouting and almost breaking down in tears till Ed just left him to it. They still interacted when Ed gave him orders as Captain, discussing supplies and routes, but it was not their camaraderie of days gone by. There was a stiffness to their interactions, like an old injury that wouldn't mend. A hurt that had never been there before. A wound Izzy had inflicted and didn’t know how to heal. Sometimes he could barely breathe when he stared into Ed’s luminous eyes when they were filled with regret and pain. Even Bonnet, the privileged twat, seemed to have lost most of his bitter vitriol when interacting with Izzy after he got Edward back.
To one degree or another, they now treated him with both pity and caution. Like a wounded animal they couldn't predict. Again, it was more than he knew he deserved.
Izzy finds himself at the edge of the bow, as far as he could get from the rest of the crew. He sought out solitude when he could these days. Even being near Ivan and Fang chafed and bruised. They seemed mostly unchanged towards him, although far happier overall with the return of Bonnet and his misfits. Fang back with Lucius and Pete, and Ivan had been enfolded into the larger group as a whole.
Izzy remained the outsider.
In a shocking turn of events, Bonnet's crew had become remarkably, almost unbelievably , skilled during their time away and most no longer required constant vigilance to not fuck everything up. It was one small relief in Izzy's tortured existence that the formerly useless crew was at least good enough now that he didn't feel on the verge of a catastrophe at all times. Not that that made them more tolerable to be around and the ship, even with Bonnet's "improvements", was still only so big. He wasn’t safe at ports and, other than his tiny and dingy room, he had nowhere to go where he could be alone. Blow off steam.
In an attempt to find some reprieve from their constant noise and grating presence, Izzy requested to be moved full time to the overnight watch. Ed had looked surprised when he asked, almost like he was about to object, but was quick enough to agree when Stede nodded his blessing. Oluwande had been moved into the position of Quartermaster, whereas Izzy still reported directly to Edward. Izzy took the brunt of the ledgers while Oluwande handled any special requests of Stede’s directly. Buttons would be his second on nights, even though he was half insane. The older pirate mostly kept his nose down and left Izzy to own devices, which Izzy was immensely grateful for. He could deal with the odd bouts of nudity to escape the rest of Bonnet’s gaggle of misfits. Maybe even find a small slice of peace. It was the most he could expect, which was fine.
Hope was a luxury he couldn't afford with what was left of his heart.
The sun had already set when Izzy found himself at the bow of the ship, the farthest point available to him from the crew’s storytime. Bonnet’s voices as he read were a dull irritation in the background, like a fly buzzing around his head. Fixing his eyes on the sea, Izzy focused his attention on her depths and willed his ears to hear nothing but her voice.
The ocean had been his life all the way back to his earliest memories. Shimmering in deep blues and turquoise under a hot Carribean sun. Splashed with black and silver beneath the cold light of a full moon. Gray and foam tossed under swirling storm clouds and bolts of lightning. Any and all iterations were beautiful to Izzy.
These days, he found himself staring at the cresting waves, imagining the dark depths, and longed to just give himself over to her. He’d lived far longer than most pirates were ever granted. A large part of that was testimony to his sword skills and his propensity to answer most challenges with immediate violence. The other part of that was his partnership with Edward Teach, and building the legend of Blackbeard. Now, all that is gone. Sure, the legend lived on, but the partnership was a shell of what they had been. Izzy felt lost, adrift, like a drowning swimmer left to sink beneath volatile waves. Gazing into the darkness, alone, there was nothing to stop him from feeling the pull of the abyss. His eyes drop down to the ocean, studying the stars glittering on the midnight dark waters. He could just hear the whisper of quiet movement and soft voices as the crew readied for bed, but it was remote. Far away. Soon, it would be silent.
What if I just let go and finally find peace….
At least, it would have been silent until a cloud of musky and herbal scented smoke swirled through the air around him.
I was able to find a slice of peace and trust Bonnet to fuck it up.
Bonnet had gotten a wild hair up his ass yesterday and started swapping out Buttons with other crew members at night, citing the thought that they should all know every role. Roach had, apparently, drawn the short straw for this week. Although his ears had not detected any footsteps, Izzy felt an awareness, a heat, as the ship’s cook stepped up silently beside him. Tall form little more than a dark shadow against the night sky. His profile is briefly illuminated by the dim red burn of a lit joint. Without speaking, Roach takes a deep breath and leans forward, bracing his elbows on the ship's railing a few feet away. The bright cherry dies down to a deep red ember as the he pauses, briefly holding his breath, before blowing out the tangy smoke to be whisked away by the ocean breeze.
"Can you smoke that shit somewhere else?" Izzy’s question is a low growl.
A flash of white teeth in the darkness. "The smoke making you dizzy, Izzy?" Roach’s musical voice is mocking but soft enough not to carry beyond the two of them.
Izzy hadn't smoked pipe weed in years, not since Edward took his second ship as Captain and Izzy's workload had doubled. He'd stopped having time for luxury like that while building a fleet. One of them had to have their wits about them and he would never ask Ed to sacrifice anything he wanted for Izzy’s comfort. The thought causes a pang in his chest, which stokes his anger. “Sure. Get fucking stoned. You'll be less than fucking useless tonight and I'll have to cover your…"
"Whale.” The word was soft, breathed out on another line of smoke.
Izzy’s growled tirade cuts off with an almost audible click as his mouth shuts and his teeth snap together. For the first time since Roach had ambled up to his side, Izzy turned and gave the other man his full attention. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Whale.” Roach raised his long fingered hand and took another deep drag, squeaking out his answer around a mouthful of smoke. “There.” He gestures with his head.
Blinking, Izzy turns his head in the direction Roach had nodded, out onto the darkened seas. The ocean is fairly calm tonight but by no means still, the reflection of heavenly bodies wavering on its dark surface. Another cloud of smoke floats around Izzy’s head and he makes a production out of a cough, ignoring the soft scoff at his side. Even through the coughing, he never took his eyes off the sea. Nothing was out there. His rage spiked. “You’re so fucking high you’re seeing shit. The last thing I fucking need is…”
With a sound almost like a whistle, water spurts into the air about fifty feet from the side of the ship. As Izzy watches, open mouthed and stunned, the black and white head of an orca breaks the clean surface of the water with powerful grace before sinking into the depths below. Its strong tail splashes down into the water, sending droplets flying before the surface settles and lays quiet again. Izzy feels his face begin to burn as a soft, lilting laugh floats through the night. The sound billows around him like the clouds of smoke from Roach’s joint and Izzy feels like he might combust with the sudden rage that floods through his veins. Roach chuckles again when Izzy remains silent. The sound is low, intimate, and that just fans the flames of his anger. On instinct, he turns to lash out and finds Roach has moved entirely too close for comfort. He’s in Izzy’s space and that knowledge makes him curl his lip in a snarl.
Roach’s dark eyes are bright with a smile that just flirts with his lips. This close, the smell of weed, wood smoke, and something minty makes his head spin. Roach clucks his tongue as he leans forward to whisper, so close Izzy can feel the heat of his breath, “You don’t have to worry, Dizzy Izzy.” He takes another long drag of his joint while Izzy stares at the glowing red ember. “I know my limits. I won’t endanger what’s mine.”
This close, Izzy can almost see the reflection of the rising moon in Roach’s pupils, and for just a second, his world spins. Thoughts fly out of his head and it’s almost like what he remembers about being stoned. For just a moment. When he blinks, his vision clears and so does the dizziness. Roach’s smile widens to show a flash of teeth and Izzy’s brain does what it does best when it’s thrown off. It gets angry. Baring his teeth in a snarl, Izzy further shortens the distance between the two of them and growls, “And just what do you consider yours, Mr. Roach?”
Something flickers in Roach’s eyes, there and gone before Izzy can get a read on it. The other man pulls back as he straightens to his full height. Taking in another lungful of herb and holding it there to a count of three. As he blows it out, he speaks around the smoke in an insolent tone. “The crew. They’re mine. To feed. To see to. I wouldn’t put the people on this ship in danger.”
Izzy scoffs as he straightens, pulling down on his vest and resettling his sword. For some reason, he’d never noticed how much taller Roach was till that moment. Not as broad in the shoulder as Edward, but he seemed to have an advantage by an inch or two of height. Or maybe that was just the half wild curls around his head giving that illusion. Either way, Izzy had stopped being intimidated by those taller than him ages ago since he’d learned to fight. “You’re just as sentimental as the rest of the pathetic twats on this boat.” For some reason, he feels a bit disappointed. He didn’t know why, but he’d expected Roach to have more sense than the emotionally compromised morons Bonnet had chosen. He’d had some hope for Jim, but even they had fallen prey to weakness with their romantic attachment to Oluwande and spent the months apart moping and hissing at him in Spanish if he got too close.
Roach blinks twice at Izzy before throwing his head back and letting out a wild laugh that shivers in the night air, as sharp as the blade of one of his cleavers. “Oh Dizzy,” he giggled again between words. “You’re a funny little thing. You really are.”
At the nickname, Izzy once again saw red. The pommel of his dagger was suddenly beneath his bare hand, cold and solid. “And just what is so fucking funny?,” he snarls, teeth bared, eyes narrowed. Bigger and more terrifying men had backed down when Izzy got that rabid dog growl in his voice.
To Izzy’s utter annoyance and disbelief, Roach seems unaffected. With a bored look, he straightens and makes Izzy sit through another drag, at which point Izzy is sure steam is coming from his ears. The other man simply watches him with wide eyes and a sardonic smile as he exhales and flicks the little bit of flaming joint that remains into the sea. “I am the cook and the doctor for this ship. You are the First Mate, as you never tire of shouting at us.” Never breaking eye contact, Roach raises his arms above his head as he gives a full body stretch, almost like a cat. “We are both responsible for taking care of the others. The way you think you are above it.” Roach chuckles as he lowers his hands and crosses his arms casually, gazed fixed and boring into Izzy.
Izzy wouldn’t ask. Wouldn’t ask. Wouldn’t. “Think I’m fucking above what?”
A cat-got-the-canary grin grows on Roach’s face. Stepping forward, he drops his hands to his hips and bends down, placing his face next to Izzy’s. Close, but not close enough to touch. Just close enough that Izzy could feel the heat of Roach’s breath tickle the shell of his ear as he responds in a low voice. “It’s funny you think you’re beyond sentiment when you’re the one who committed treason for it.”
With the speed he’s infamous for, Izzy grabs Roach by the collar of his striped shirt and shoves him against the railing, hanging him over the side. In the same motion, his other hand pulls his dagger, pressing it to the vulnerable skin of Roach’s throat. Fear flashes through the other man’s eyes briefly before Roach gathers his own anger, his lip curling in a snarl of defiance. Izzy bares his teeth in an answering snarl as he growls right into Roach’s face, “You have no fucking idea what the fuck you’re talking about.”
Roach holds his angry gaze, and showing titanic balls, actually leans in closer. “Then why are you still here, Dizzy Izzy?,” he hisses. “If not sentiment, why do you serve the man who maimed you?”
Izzy felt the words like the blow of a sword straight through his gut. He wanted to scream. To rage. To rip Roach's miserable fucking head from his miserable fucking body.To deny, tell the bastard cook he had no concept of loyalty, not the way Izzy did. None of them did. Only Izzy had been there when they were gone, to pick up the pieces and take the brunt of the pain, and now they had come back and Izzy was once again on the outside and he’d lost everything because of….
Suddenly, his mental rant comes to a screeching halt as he notices Roach’s expression has changed. The fear was gone from his face, as was the derision. The other man’s jaw had softened, mouth slightly open, eyes wide in clear surprise. As Izzy watches, Roach’s cheek twitches as a tear splashes down and hits his skin. “Izzy?,” he whispers as another tear hits. This time, he doesn’t flinch.
Izzy does.
“Fuck!” With a scream, Izzy jerks back and releases his hold on Roach at the same time. Blood rushes to his face and flames there, burning across his cheekbones. His head gives a throb of pain, the shame flashing through him more painful than the lash.
"Ow! What the fuck?!!" Roach lands on his back with a thud as Izzy mindlessly resheathes his dagger and steps back, frantically wiping any evidence of weakness from his face.
"Fuck off." The words growled out as menacingly as before he turns to move, to get away. To hide. Like the weak little bastard you are, whispered the voice in his head, like a whip crack.
"Izzy, hold on!," Roach had scrambled to his feet remarkably quickly and was starting to follow him when Izzy whipped around with such speed and fury that Roach drew up short.
Pointing a shaking finger, Izzy tries to lower his volume, reign in his fear, but there’s still a tremor in his words that betrays him. "You will fucking forget this ever fucking happened and I won't cut your fucking balls off while you fucking sleep." Izzy knows, can feel, that his eyes are too wide. His breaths come too fast. Cheeks hot as humiliation burns through him like molten lava.
Roach holds up his hands, palms out, like you’d approach a spooked beast. His eyes are narrowed, face etched into lines of concern. "Whoa, no problem but…. are you OK?"
"Leave me the fuck alone!” With that, he turns on his heel and stalks away from the bewildered cook, bracing himself for laughter that doesn't come.